Book Image

Mathematics for Game Programming and Computer Graphics

By : Penny de Byl
5 (1)
Book Image

Mathematics for Game Programming and Computer Graphics

5 (1)
By: Penny de Byl

Overview of this book

Mathematics is an essential skill when it comes to graphics and game development, particularly if you want to understand the generation of real-time computer graphics and the manipulation of objects and environments in a detailed way. Python, together with Pygame and PyOpenGL, provides you with the opportunity to explore these features under the hood, revealing how computers generate and manipulate 3D environments. Mathematics for Game Programming and Computer Graphics is an exhaustive guide to getting “back to the basics” of mathematics, using a series of problem-based, practical exercises to explore ideas around drawing graphic lines and shapes, applying vectors and vertices, constructing and rendering meshes, and working with vertex shaders. By leveraging Python, Pygame, and PyOpenGL, you’ll be able to create your own mathematics-based engine and API that will be used throughout to build applications. By the end of this graphics focussed book, you’ll have gained a thorough understanding of how essential mathematics is for creating, rendering, and manipulating 3D virtual environments and know the secrets behind today’s top graphics and game engines.
Table of Contents (26 chapters)
1
Part 1 – Essential Tools
9
Part 2 – Essential Trigonometry
14
Part 3 – Essential Transformations
20
Part 4 – Essential Rendering Techniques

Adding Lighting Effects

Lighting in computer graphics serves the same purpose as it does in the real world. It provides definition to the rendering of objects, making them seem embedded in the virtual world. The way that light is perceived depends on the surface treatment of the objects. These treatments are defined as materials and will be discussed in the next section.

Light sources consist of three primary lighting interactions:

  • Ambient light represents the background light in an environment that doesn’t emanate from anywhere. It’s like the light that you can still see in a room when all the lights are out, but you can still make out the shapes of objects because light might be leaking into the room through windows. It is light that has been reflected and scattered so much that you can’t tell where it is coming from. It’s a basic coloring and although it doesn’t emanate from a particular source, in computer graphics, it is assigned as...